


Fathoms Deep and Miles Off Shore

by Nny



Series: 2019 Valentine's Requests [7]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Cruise Ships, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M, Mutual Pining, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-28 21:59:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17795516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nny/pseuds/Nny
Summary: “All cruises are retirement cruises,” Clint told him with a shrug. “Plus you can’t complain - free travel, free drinks, and all the shuffleboard you can eat.”





	Fathoms Deep and Miles Off Shore

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kangofu_CB](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kangofu_CB/gifts).



There were two distinct types of morning, at Bucky and Clint’s place. There was the type of morning where Clint was bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived, yawning into his cereal and missing his mouth with three spoons out of his five, drinking directly out of the coffee pot and making baggy shirts look too damned hot. On these mornings, Bucky was grumpy.

Then there were the mornings where Clint was still-awake rather than just-. Where he was almost audibly buzzing from the caffeine, and grinning fit to bust, and talking faster than ought to be legal, before the sun was all the way up. On these mornings - on  _this_  morning - Bucky was  _fucking_  grumpy.

He only caught two words out of every ten, burying his head in the metaphorical desert of Instagram before 10am.

“ - contest,” Clint said, and Bucky grunted, and a little later there was definitely - “time off,” and Bucky absently nodded his head.

“Okay,” Clint said, grinning all over his face and making Bucky tired just looking at him, “okay, I’ll get everything sorted.”

“Mm,” Bucky agreed, and went back to bed.

*

Two weeks and two canvas bags and two arguments later, and Bucky followed Clint on board the towering cruise ship, snagging his sunglasses from the collar of his shirt and sliding them on just to escape the endless  _white_  - the boat, the passengers, the passengers’ hair…

“You did  _not_ ,” Bucky hissed, “mention it was a fuckin’  _retirement cruise_.”

“All cruises are retirement cruises,” Clint told him with a shrug. “Plus you can’t complain - free travel, free drinks, and all the shuffleboard you can eat.”

A crew member appeared, clad in - naturally - spotless white, the better to match his teeth.

“Mr Barton and - Mr Barton, I assume,” he said, and Bucky’s mouth dropped open.

“Smile, honey,” Clint said, outta the side of his mouth, “we’re newlyweds, after all.”

*

“One bed,” Bucky said, through gritted teeth. “There’s one. Fucking. Bed.”

Clint gave him a cringing sort of grin and held out a cocktail, which was so full of swords and monkeys and umbrellas and cherries that he was almost able to hide behind it.

Bucky grabbed it and took a grim swig.

*

“Oh Edna,” Clint said, taking her arm carefully, almost visibly straining under the weight of her line of thick gold bracelets. “You say the sweetest things.”

Bucky was staying where it was safe, over by the bar; everything was softened by a sort of rosy haze, and he’d collected a menagerie of monkeys and was trying to build a tower. He was grimly making his way through something purple and trying not to resent the elderly, couldn’t decide whether the delighted grin Clint sent him made things better or worse.

He dismounted his stool once all the purple was gone, waiting to find his sea legs before he set off across the floor. Clint was holding court, centre of attention, just where he always liked to be, and Bucky glared at the line of his back, muscles beautifully outlined against the tight material of his shirt.

“…at first,” Clint was saying, as Bucky came closer. “I mean, he’s beautiful, but the scowl has to give you some reservations. Then he turned out to be really good for snuggling, and secretly loved Dog Cops, and bought Hello Kitty band-aids just to make me smile, and I kinda lost track of where friendship ended and found myself over the border and stranded without my passport.”

The chorus of old ladies cooed at Clint’s nonsensical story-telling, and Bucky pressed up behind him and wound his arms around Clint’s stomach, burying his smile into the material that covered his shoulder blade, and wondered when this kinda hug had become something they did.

*

“ - only woman under fifty, I swear,” Clint snapped, arms wrapped around himself even though the ship’s passage only created the barest of breezes.

“I wasn’t  _flirting_ ,” Bucky said, too many cocktails pounding in his temples and grinding away at his temper. “She wasn’t even my type.”

“Like that matters,” Clint muttered. “They all fall for the goddamned Bucky Barnes charm.”

“Well maybe you shoulda brought someone else along then, asshole!”

Clint opened his mouth and then bit his lip, turning on his heel and disappearing off along the well-lit deck. Bucky looked out over the railing, at the way the ship created stars in the water and then the world beyond it disappeared, and then he swore softly and went to find some water he could actually drink.

*

“I didn’t  _want_  to bring anyone else along, asshole.”

Clint’s voice was low and miserable in the pitch darkness of the cabin, as far away as he was able to get in a cabin-sized bed.

Bucky edged around until he found the nightstand, carefully placing his refilled bottle of water before he crawled clumsily onto the mattress.

“’d be nice if you’d make a little sense, sometimes,” Bucky said, rolling onto his side so he could face the patch of darkness where Clint was, sliding his hand along the sheet with a gentle hiss and then leaving it empty there, waiting. Took a moment before he felt Clint’s calluses, pressing against his palm.

“I make sense when you know the context,” Clint told him, and Bucky thought about that. Thought about how boats made the most sense in the context of the ocean; about how Bucky made the most sense in the context of Clint.

“I think I’m starting to get that,” Bucky said, and shuffled in closer, shifted his position so their fingers could interweave.

*

“When did you know it was love?” Edna asked, and Bucky grinned his most charming grin, tightening his fingers a little against Clint’s.

“You always go for the easy questions, huh?” He turned to look at Clint, at the ocean-blue of his eyes and his sunshine-golden hair; at his smile that flashed like the light off the waves. “I guess I didn’t know until I was already out in the middle of it,” he said, helpless against it, helpless against the smile that followed it, “fathoms deep and miles off shore.”


End file.
